


View from the Lower Decks

by Roguefemme



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Thrawn Trilogy - Timothy Zahn
Genre: spoilers for the Thrawn trilogy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-31
Updated: 2018-03-31
Packaged: 2018-12-22 01:32:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11956896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roguefemme/pseuds/Roguefemme
Summary: Vignettes of the Chimaera crewpeople and their reactions to the events of the Thrawn trilogy.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Here is the first in what will hopefully be a series (depending on my motivation) of the crew and lower-ranking officers of the Chimaera. I took the liberty of using for this chapter a few of my OCs from Two Steps Ahead, but future chapters might also center on stormtroopers and other crewpeople. 
> 
> As always, reviews give me life and inspiration and please leave them. Thanks! <3

  
"I'm a pilot. A damn good one,"  Lt. Cmdr Isamu Li Anek groused, not for the first time, from his prone position on the floor under the frame he was assembling. "I've got better things t'do than put together jungle gyms for fuzzy snakes."  
  
"They're carry frames, and I'm pretty sure the 'fuzzy snakes' are called ysalamiri," newly minted Commander Pelli Sheplin rested an elbow on a nearby shelf and smirked down at her friend - at least the half of him that was visible. "And if the Grand Admiral says make frames for lizards, you make frames for lizards. He and Captain Pellaeon run a tight ship, you can't cut up here and charm your way out of it."  
  
"Thanks for the faith in me," Anek moved just enough so one eye appeared from around the ysalamir frame he was working on so he could give her a glare. "Feel free t'get down here and help." Even after over a decade in the Imperial Navy, Isamu Li Anek hadn't entirely lost his Outer Rim accent. And, Sheplin thought with amusement, he probably wasn't trying too hard to lose it either- something he got away mostly because of his exceptional talent as a pilot. Anek disappeared under the frame again. "What does he need these things for anyway?"  
  
"For the lizards?" Sheplin smirked, and received a glare for her wit.  
  
"I mean the lizards," he clarified grumpily,  "I'm used to not knowin' what's goin' on in the Admiral's head, but this is strange even for him. You know anything?"  
  
"I've heard rumors," Sheplin sat down gracefully on the deck next to her friend. "But they're pretty bizarre."  
  
"Oh? Like what?" his muffled reply was followed by a hand reaching out. "Hand me the hydrospanner, would you?"  
  
"The one I'm hearing most is they're some kind of anti-Jedi weapon." She found the correct tool and placed it into his hand, which disappeared with it.  
  
"Stop messin' around," came his gruff reply.  
  
"I'm not," Sheplin protested, albeit sounding slightly amused. "Tschel swears he heard the Admiral and Captain Pellaeon talking about it."  
  
"Drama boy Tschel?" Li chuckled, and scooted out from under the frame. "There, that's done and I'm takin' a break. I need some caf. You want some? I'm buyin'."  
  
"It's free in the commissary, you nerf," Sheplin laughed, and fell into step beside him. "Yeah, that's him. I used to think Nati was exaggerating about Daralhan guys, but if he's a typical one, she wasn't lying."  
  
Li made a noncommittal noise and for a moment each looked away, lost in their own thoughts as they exited the hanger bay where he had been working.  
  
"At any rate, he might exaggerate but he doesn't make up stuff whole cloth," Li remarked. "But anti-Jedi? Are there even any of those left?"  
  
"Not that I know of," Sheplin said grimly. "But with the Emperor and Vader dead, guess who'd end up having to hunt down any that remained?"  
  
Li muttered a potent Outer Rim oath that made Sheplin hiss in warning and look around the hall to make sure he hadn't been overheard.  
  
"I wonder if that's why Comm- I mean, Grand Admiral Thrawn recalled me from the Exploration Corps? Maybe he's thinkin' he might have to chase them through some jungle worlds?" He met her eyes and they shared a silent moment of mutual apprehension.  
  
"I know the Academy taught us the Jedi were just shams," Sheplin said very quietly, "but they weren't. Darth Vader could strangle someone from across the room without touching them, and block blaster bolts with his lightsaber. And after Order 66, he and the Inquisitors hunted down the surviving Jedi. Now he's dead and there are no more Inquisitors. How could _we_ hunt rogue Jedi with no Force users on our side?"  
  
"With an anti-Jedi weapon, I guess," Li ventured dubiously.  
  
"Well, if anybody in the galaxy could do it, it would be Grand Admiral Thrawn," Pelli smiled, a tad shakily but sincerely.  
  
"True that," he acknowledged as they entered the commissary. "Ain't that a thing to get used to, though? Our old instructor, a Grand Admiral. Highest rank y'can get without takin' the throne."  
  
"Not all that surprising though, considering," Pelli nodded toward the shortest of the lines and they headed for it. "He's the last one, too, you know," she added in a more normal conversational tone.  
  
"The last what?" Li took a cup for himself and handed another to her.  
  
"Grand Admiral." She stepped around him to another dispenser and typed in the sequence for her drink. "All the others were killed in internecine fighting, or executed by the Rebels. Thrawn is the last surviving Grand Admiral."  
  
Li muttered another profanity and this time Sheplin didn't correct him. "So he's the top man in the Empire now?" He took his caf and they headed for a table.  
  
"I heard there are some renegade governors, Moffs, other types not wanting to give up their territories, but legally yes," she settled in a chair and added, "He's the highest ranking Imperial Navy officer left in the galaxy. And with his successes against the Rebels, more and more ships and officers are joining him every day."  
  
"If he's huntin' Jedi, he's gonna need 'em," Li remarked grimly.  



	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter dedicated to Humansrsuperior, for being so delightfully enthusiastic about this fic and waiting patiently while it took me forever to update. Thanks hon!

 

"So you've seen them?" Li asked curiously over lunch some days later.

"Most of the bridge crew have. Grand Admiral Thrawn has started keeping them on the bridge all the time now," Sheplin replied, and smiled. "They're kind of cute, actually."

"Cute?" Li gave her a skeptical look. "They're lizards."

"They are cute." Pelli wrinkled her nose at him. "And the Admiral obviously likes them. He often carries one around in his arms or wrapped around his shoulders. He pets them." She looked down at her plate to scoot some food together before taking a forkful to eat.

"I hope I didn't put together all those frames just for _pet lizards_ ," Li complained, scowling at his own plate.

"I doubt it," Pelli replied when she'd swallowed the mouthful. "And anyway, are _you_ going to tell a Grand Admiral no?" She smirked a challenge at him, knowing what any intelligent being with a modicum of survival instinct would answer.

"Not _that_ one, for sure," he conceded, shrugging. "I may be crazy but I'm not stupid. Seein' him mad once was plenty scary enough for me, and it wasn't even me he was mad at."

"When did you ever see the Grand Admiral angry?" Pelli asked. That was a story didn't remember hearing, and the normally calm Thrawn getting angry seemed pretty memorable.

"He wasn't a..." Li began, but stopped when his attention was diverted by someone hastily approaching their table.

"Hey!" Lt. Tschel rushed up, just barely stopping in time to avoid colliding with their table. The two officers looked up at him with raised eyebrows. "You're not going to _believe_ this!" he told them, breathless with exertion and excitement.

"I bet I won't," Li mumbled, then jolted a little when Pelli poked his leg with her foot under the table. She gave him a sidelong warning look, to which he gave back a grumpy face but subsided.

Tschel didn't appear to notice. "I found out what the Grand Admiral wanted the lizards for. He has a Jedi!" Both Li and Sheplin sat up straight in their seats, staring at him in plain shock, and he grinned with gratification at their reaction.

"What th' _kriff_ are you talkin' about?" Li demanded gruffly. "What would he need anti-Force lizards for if he's _allied_ with a Jedi?"

Tschel pulled out a chair and plopped down into it, then leaned forward to speak to them in a conspiratorial tone. "Because he doesn't trust him. The guy's crazy, scary crazy. I heard he tried to kill the Admiral and the Captain when they went down to the planet to see him."

Sheplin looked at Li and he met her gaze, both thinking the same thing. They trusted the Grand Admiral implicitly, but what could Thrawn possibly have to gain by bringing an insane Jedi onto his flagship?

"I've got to go. Talk to you later!" Tschel rose from the chair and hurried off, no doubt eager to share his gossip with someone else.

"On second thought, I think I'd rather be huntin' a crazy Jedi than have him hangin' around the ship," Li remarked grimly. Sheplin didn't reply, but the tightness in her face and the press of her lips in a straight line spoke for her opinion of the matter. They sat in nervous silence while they finished their meals.

"Maybe Tschel is just exaggerating," Pelli finally ventured as she put her napkin down next to her plate, sounding as if she was trying to convince herself as well as her crewmate.

"Pel, it's been decades since the Jedi Purge," Li Anek replied quietly. "If any Jedi are still alive I'd be shocked if they _weren't_ messed up in the head from bein' on the run for so long after losin' everything."

  
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"Tschel wasn't exaggerating," Sheplin informed her friend grimly the next evening when they met for a post-shift drink. "That Jedi came to the bridge during my duty shift and I swear I've never in my life been so creeped out by an old man."

Anek studied her over the rim of his glass as if looking for any hint of untruth. "He's really that bad?"

"Worse," Sheplin glanced over her shoulder toward the door. "Yeah. A lot worse. You can _feel_ the crazy on him. And Grand Admiral Thrawn doesn't like him either. The guy - C'Baoth is his name - was arguing with the Admiral, and not politely like Captain Pellaeon does either. He was being _insulting_. To a Grand Admiral! You don't **_do_** that, especially with Thrawn!"

"Patience, Commander," Li drawled in an intentionally bad imitation of Thrawn. Pelli glared at him in exasperation, and then unwillingly smiled and shook her head.

"Mark my words though," she said grimly, "Thrawn may need him now, but once he doesn't anymore that loony old Jedi is gonna wind up dead. Thrawn might even do it personally."

"That'd be one doozy of a battle," Li remarked, the look on his face part fascination and part trepidation.

"Yeah, but would you want to be on the same ship when it happened?" Pelli pointed out.

"I wouldn't want to be in the same _sector_ when it happened," Li said, with a theatrical shudder that wasn't entirely feigned.

"You and me both," she agreed.

  
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Li walked into the commissary where he and Sheplin usually met for dinner, and found an unnerving hush over the normally lively groups of officers at the tables. In place of the usual off-duty chatting and laughter there were only murmurs and whispers, punctuated by furtive looks around. Li had never witnessed it so subdued there; certainly not when so many people crowded it.

He found Sheplin sitting alone at a nearby table, looking distinctly shaken. She'd just come from a shift on the bridge, and her tense posture and expression made Li uneasily suspicious that there was some truth to the rumours he had been trying to disbelieve.

He took the chair opposite her and she looked up to meet his eyes.

"It's true, isn't it?" he asked, though her reddened eyes had already washed away his doubt.

"Yeah," she whispered, and cleared her throat sharply. "Yes," she said in a more normal tone. "I was there. I saw it."

"I was hopin' it was just a rumour," Li mumbled, staring down into his drink.

"If only it was," Pelli said, and shivered. "Grand Admiral Thrawn had that bodyguard of his execute Pieterson. He was so cold about it, too. Like Pieterson's death didn't matter at all. That's the kind of thing I'd have expected from Vader, not Thrawn."

Uncharacteristically, Isamu Li Anek could think of nothing to say.

"He's changed," Pelli added, quietly and a bit sadly. "He always had a streak of ruthlessness, but he still cared about keeping his people alive, a lot more than most Imperial officers. I couldn't imagine him back then having just - _executed_ one of us."

"He's fightin' a war," Li pointed out, though still looking troubled. "From what I've heard, he just came back from fighting another war out in Wild Space and then he comes back and finds the damned Rebellion is takin' down everything he worked so hard to defend."

"And now it's all on him - him and us, his people - to make it right," Sheplin finished the thought. "And we will. Because we have to."

"Yeah. Yeah we will."

"But the question is how ruthless he's going to become in order to get that done," Sheplin said sadly. "Not just because he'll be in charge when it's all over, but because he was always a good commander who cared about his people; about everyone, like it's his job to protect the whole galaxy. And I'm afraid that good man might be destroyed by this war even if Thrawn survives."

"You're right," Li said, "As long as we've known him he's been capable of ruthlessness when he has to, but it's like it isn't taking a toll on him like it used to. Like instead of just doing ruthless things when he has to, he's _becoming_ ruthless. And that's..." he trailed off, searching for a word.

"Terrifying," Pelli whispered, and he could only agree.

"You're not gonna believe who I saw today," Li commented, obviously hoping to lighten the dark mood. "Gilsaria Zanedi."

Pelli frowned in thought as she searched her mind, trying to place the name.

"One of Thrawn's Crew at the Academy, a year ahead of us. She was the head of the fourth year flight team," he added to jog her memory.

"Oh, of course!" Pelli brightened with recognition. "Wow, I haven't seen her since the Academy. How is she?"

"Just fine, and commanding her own ship now. The _Stormwind_. Not a big ship, but a good sound one."

"Niiice," Pelli approved with a grin. "The Fleet needs more competent commanders. And now that Thrawn's in charge that's going to start happening."

"Kriffin' right, and long overdue." Li held up his glass for a toast. "Here's to Thrawn's Imperial Fleet!"

"And the end of the Rebellion!" Pelli clinked hers against it.

After they had toasted and drank, Li lowered his gaze to the table unhappily. "They got Kess Huurlek, you know."

"What?!" Pelli yelped. She had good reason to remember the then-cadet a year ahead of her who had once given her a timely warning.

"He was serving on the _Executor_ at the Battle of Endor. No survivors." He scowled down into his drink. "Bastard Rebels. He could've been commanding a ship of our fleet now. I heard they took out a few of Thrawn's Crew from the year ahead of him too."

"Terrorist scum," Pelli's normally cheerful face contorted in a brief snarl. "Well, the reckoning is coming now. The Grand Admiral is back and I heard he's arranging to get all of us back and in place to help - all his Crew from all the classes he taught, everyone who's still alive."

"And we'll make those _sleemo_ pay for every Imperial life they've taken. _New Republic_ ," he spat, the words practically dripping scorn. "I've read about what the Old Republic was like. Corrupt and useless. The Emperor wasn't nice but when he said something was gonna get done, it kriffing got _done_. No corrupt bureaucrats arguin' forever and a day over everything and siphoning off money that was supposed to help people. He kept them under control."

"And now Thrawn is in charge. He'll bring down some reality on the Rebels," Pelli vowed with grim satisfaction. "He's already got them scrambling around like scared yardbirds. Their pet Jedi won't save them this time."

" _Jedi_ ," Li snorted his opinion of that. "Some poseur with an inflated ego and a stolen lightsaber, more like. I heard he's claimin' to be the son of some Jedi who was killed back in the Clone Wars. Probably isn't even old enough."

"And even if it was true, who'd train him?" she pointed out. "The Empire killed all the Jedi, the Rebels killed all the Inquisitors, there's nobody left."

"Like that'd stop them," he said disgustedly. "They lie about wanting what's best for everyone, they lie about being a legitimate government, what's to stop 'em from lying about having a Jedi?"

"Nothing," Pelli said flatly. "Nothing at all."

 

 

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